ABSTRACT
The eastern peri-urban area of Kolkata still has remnants of the vast expanse of marshlands which are currently known as the East Kolkata Wetlands. The wetlands are often referred to as the ‘Kidneys of Kolkata’ because of the unique mechanisms they possesses that can naturally treat and purify waste water. However, in recent times the area has come under repeated onslaught of conversions, both legal and illegal, and encroachments. In addition, the current government and a large section of the urban inhabitants, as well as the wetland communities who are increasingly veering towards consumerism, exclusivism and divisiveness, see it as an empty space into which the city can expand its urban footprint.
The chapter is an attempt to examine the impacts of the new urban aspirations of Kolkata upon a protected site like the East Kolkata Wetlands from an urban political ecology perspective because the concept of political ecology strives to integrate the concepts of political economy with the growing concerns about the health of ecology. So, at a time when the city is witnessing a form of urbanization that has become characteristic of neoliberalism-driven economic growth, political ecology can aid the understanding of the reason and the manner behind the reclamation and straightjacketing of the East Kolkata Wetlands into land for the urban market. Using the concept of political ecology, the paper shall attempt to analyze the role of the state and its agencies in the transformation of the wetlands and discern the nature of response from the people of the city towards the dismantling of a protected site like the East Kolkata Wetlands.
